Not detected. The online scanner did not identify the website which contained material that had been plagiarised.

Basic plagiarism – copied and pasted from an electronic book

Unable to test – users are only permitted five scans per month.

General observationsEase of use, overall experience. If other features were included (e.g. spelling, grammar check), how easy were they to use and how useful were they?

One of the most worrying thing about ThePensters.com is the replacement of the "s' in Pensters with a large dollar sign – this adorns the banner across the top of the website. ThePensters.com is a brokerage website which provides a custom essay writing service for its customers. Its plagiarism scanner is a "free" resource which only its registered writers and previous customers can use.The first drawback to the scanner is that you first have to register as a writer for the website. Unlike a simple online registration, they require the user to upload a copy of their CV, three samples of their work and even a picture. Once registered, writers are only permitted a meagre five scans per month by contrast to previous customers of the website, who can have up to a hundred per month. This can't be topped up in anyway, even with a subscription, so it's very limited in this respect. Why the website has done this is a mystery – using the scanner is much like using any search engine, it's an entirely automated process which runs on algorithms, so there is no need to restrict its use in this way.The scanner is also very limited in other respects too. A website devoted to providing custom essays might be expected to be well versed in detecting plagiarism, yet during five tests carried out, it only detected plagiarism in one instance, where work had been directly copied and pasted from an internet source. It did not detect plagiarism in samples where words had been removed or changed, nor did it detect paraphrased work. Due to the limits imposed on the number of scans carried out by writers, the scanner could not be tested to see if it detected plagiarism from an electronic book; however, on its track record, this seems unlikely.After completing the checks and feeling pretty disappointed, I returned to the home page only to discover my picture under a heading "Latest Approved Writers" – along with an invitation to read my blog! This is probably why it wouldn't let me complete the registration process without uploading a picture first...

Given the hassle of registering and the poor performance of its scanner, those who are looking for plagiarism detectors are advised to search elsewhere!